For a social Europe - without unemployment, poverty and exclusion

International conference of unemployed trade union members and representatives of trade unions from four European countries

Bielefeld, 5-8 October 2000

DECLARATION

We, the unemployed trade union members and representatives of trade unions from Belgium, Germany, the Netherlands and Austria

demand that the national and European legislative bodies, local, national and European politicians

• include trade unions and representatives of the jobless in all labour market and social policy evaluations, schemes and measures;
• focus strictly on the reduction of unemployment as their ultimate objective: The fight is against unemployment - not against the unemployed;
• create an environment which allows the development and dissemination of socially fair labour market and social policy models on the local as well as the national level;
• agree on unified quality and quantity criteria for standards of social security and skills improvement for the jobless and set minimum standards;
• increase public support for ecologically sound and meaningful work and employment and in doing so emphasise the importance of creating regular jobs;

demand that the national trade unions, trade union associations and the European Trade Union Congress

• treat unemployed colleagues in the same way and give them the same rights in their organisational structures and bodies they accord to other interest groups and support the work and membership of unemployed colleagues in the trade unions without reservation;
• take more consistent and offensive steps against any kind of social exclusion and discrimination against the unemployed;
• propagate reduction of weekly working time and statutory maximum working hours as efficient models for redistributing existing work in favour of the unemployed;
• enable and instruct the European Trade Union Congress to represent the interests of unemployed colleagues and to support their cause as co-ordinator within the European trade union movement;

expect that the regional and national associations of the unemployed

• increase their national and Europe-wide co-operation, improve their co-ordination and create networks for joint political activities;
• claim and support representation of their interests within trade unions and umbrella organisations
• follow the appeal launched by the European Trade Union Congress and the Euromarches to hold a rally on 6 December 2000, the eve of the European summit in Nice, in order to demonstrate for embedding basic social rights into the Union Treaty and for a European labour market policy.

Bielefeld, 8 October 2000

The international conference »For a social Europe - without unemployment, poverty and exclusion« was organised by Föderverin gewerkschaftliche Arbeitslosenarbeit e.V. in co-operation with IG Metall. It was funded by the Directorate General for Employment and Social Affairs at the European Commission.
Taking part were 70 unemployed union members and representatives of trade unions from Belgium, Germany, the Netherlands and Austria.

Contakt:
Koordinierungsstelle gewerkschaftlicher Arbeitslosengruppen
Marktstr. 10
33602 Bielefeld
Fon: 0049-(0)521-96784-0
Fax: 0049-(0)521-96784-22
e-mail: info@erwerbslos.de
www.erwerbslos.de